If you love granola as much as I do, you will love this easy recipe. Store-bought granola can be incredibly expensive, loaded with sugar and icky ingredients, and often is not celiac-safe.

Is there anything better than chocolate? I mean, really. Any day is better when it starts with chocolate, especially a healthy version like this! The batch is large enough to make several servings, so a few minutes of effort will give you delicious breakfasts for the whole week.

Recipe

Makes approximately 10 servings

• 4 cups dry old fashioned oats
• 1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1/3 cup organic cane sugar
• 1/3 cup maple syrup
• 1/4 cup almonds, chopped
• 1/8 cup flaxseeds, optional
• 1/8 cup dry uncooked quinoa, optional
• 1/2 cup oil
• 1 Tbsp honey

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Lightly grease a 9×13 pan, and set aside.

In a large bowl, combine dry ingredients. Add oil, syrup, and honey, and mix to coat oats and chocolate evenly.

Pour ingredients into prepared pan and press lightly to pack together. Bake 30-35 minutes, until slightly browned.

Allow to cool completely. Break oats into clusters and store in an airtight container for 2-3 weeks.

Notes

If you have celiac disease or are gluten sensitive, double check to ensure your oats (and all ingredients) are gluten free and not cross-contaminated.

If you are following a vegan diet, the honey can be omitted from this recipe. It helps the clusters stick together, but they will still toast and clump somewhat without honey.

Cane sugar can be substituted with any other sweetener of your choice. While I try to eliminate refined sugars as much as possible in my diet, I do occasionally use a small amount of cane sugar. I find it enhances the taste in this recipe, but feel free to experiment with alternatives.

This recipe works equally well with coconut oil, canola oil, or most other light oils. I can’t tolerate much coconut oil, so I don’t typically use it in quantities this large. But it would add a nice flavor to this recipe, and would be a healthy oil option.

If chopping almonds is challenging for you because of pain, mobility, or fatigue, you may want to use a food processor or a slap-chop device. The slap-chop is my go to for recipes like this, and it makes short (easy!) work of chopping almonds. You could also substitute different nuts in this recipe if you’d prefer, such as walnuts, pecans, or sunflower seeds. Or, if you have a nut allergy, they can be left out altogether. You may just need to increase the quantity of oats slightly, or decrease the liquid ingredients.

While cooked quinoa usually requires rinsing, I’ve found that quinoa added to my granola doesn’t have a bitter taste despite not being rinsed. I simply add the dry grains to my mixture and bake it all together. If you find it slightly bitter, feel free to rinse and dry the quinoa thoroughly, then add it to the recipe. Alternatively, you could substitute the quinoa for chia, puffed rice, or another grain of your choice.

Enjoy!